


deck the halls (with help from your live-in ghost boy band)

by hi_hello_hey_there



Series: you don't have to say i love you (to say i love you) [12]
Category: Julie and The Phantoms (TV)
Genre: Carlos Loves the Boys, Christmas Decorations, Gen, Reggie's Big Brother Tendencies
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-14
Updated: 2020-12-14
Packaged: 2021-03-10 19:20:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,250
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28062318
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hi_hello_hey_there/pseuds/hi_hello_hey_there
Summary: "Cross my heart and hope to die."
Relationships: Alex & Carlos Molina & Julie Molina & Ray Molina & Luke Patterson & Reggie, Carlos Molina & Reggie
Series: you don't have to say i love you (to say i love you) [12]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1942267
Comments: 17
Kudos: 120





	deck the halls (with help from your live-in ghost boy band)

**Author's Note:**

> Un-beta'd so please let me know if there's any mistakes!
> 
> Dedicated to: [gay-in-221b](https://gay-in-221b.tumblr.com/)! Jess has been of invaluable help and friendship pretty much since the first week and her love for the holidays really inspired these next few stories. Show her some love!

Christmas is Carlos’s favorite time of the year. Something about seeing everyone’s lights up and the music playing over the mall speakers and the peppermint hot chocolate at Starbucks puts a content feeling in his belly the whole month. They’re a little late to the decorating party considering Julie’s accident and all the rehabilitation that comes with it, but it doesn’t really bug him. Especially because this morning goes from good to great when he wakes up to the sounds of Jingle Bells and the decoration boxes pulled up from the basement.

“Are we decorating today?” he yells, bursting into the kitchen with an erratic grin on his face.

His dad laughs at the stove, flipping a pancake onto the growing stack beside him. “Yeah. After we eat.”

“Finally!” Carlos does a little happy dance around the island, unable to contain the excitement at putting up the tree and the garlands and the wreath on the door.

His dad ruffles his hair as he passes by him. “Go get Julie and the boys. Breakfast is almost ready.” He jerks his thumb over his shoulder at the garage and Carlos heads out the back door.

Humming Frosty the Snowman as he goes, he makes his way out to the studio. He can practically see the lights trimming the house and the big inflatable Santa his dad will wrangle into the front lawn. Last Christmas, they almost hadn’t done anything. His mom had died only a few months prior and nobody was really feeling up to getting in the festive spirit. But Carlos had insisted, because Christmas was mom’s favorite time of the year, too, and he needed to feel close to her. They hadn’t done much aside from some string lights on the porch, their artificial Christmas tree adorned only with his mom’s favorite ornaments and the star, but it had been better than nothing.

He doesn’t bother knocking when he pulls the door to the studio open, barging inside amidst their rehearsal. It isn’t often that he gets to be up close and personal with the phantoms, but they continue on playing through his entrance and stay visible. “Look at you guys. Professional musicians, you are. Not even the handsomest, smartest, most talented guy in the world walking into the room can stop you.” It raises a laugh out of Reggie who plucks his part of the harmony they were practicing absently on his bass strings.

“Okay, doofus,” Julie replies with a fond eye roll from behind her keyboard. “What do you want?”

“Dad says breakfast is ready. Oh, and we’re decorating today!”

“Decorating?” Alex asks. He keeps up a steady beat. “For what?”

“Only the best holiday ever!” He knows they’ve been dead for a while, but did they really forget about the joy of Christmas.

Luke gives a chuckle, his fingers moving mindlessly over the frets of his guitar. “Halloween already happened, little man.”

“No, you ding dong. Christmas!”

“Oh, is it that time of year already?” His playful smirk lets Carlos know that Luke is messing with him.

“Ha ha. Now come on. I’m hungry and dad made pancakes.” He moves to grab Julie’s crutches for her and helps her maneuver off the piano bench.

“Pancakes! I miss pancakes!” is all Carlos hears from Reggie before the boys disappear when they stop playing.

Together, he and Julie make their way back into the house, taking their good, sweet time on the steps. He holds the door open as she hobbles past him, making her way to the sink to wash her hands. “ _Buenos días, mija_ ,” dad greets her. She allows him to drop a kiss on her forehead as she picks up the drying towel.

“ _Buenos días, papa_ ,” she choruses back. There’s a pause before she continues. “The boys say it smells great.”

“Thanks, guys.” It had taken a little while to get used to, but both Carlos and his dad had stopped using Julie as the mediator for their responses since the ghosts could hear them, just not the other way around. Even though it’s a little strange having a one-sided interpreter, it’s better than the alternative of not communicating at all.

Carlos practically inhales his pancakes, waiting mostly patiently for the others to be done so he can help clear the table before rushing back to his room to get cleaned up. He brushes his teeth, washes his face, combs his hair, and changes into his favorite holiday tee shirt in record time, sprinting back down the stairs before Julie has even made it out of the kitchen. “Don’t hurt yourself!” she calls to him.

“I’m not gonna get hurt. I’m just excited!” He’s practically vibrating when his sister takes a seat on the couch by him, swinging her injured leg up and letting the other one dangle.

“Okay,” his dad says, entering the living room and rubbing his hands together. “Where do we begin? Carlos?”

A delighted smile takes over his face as he approaches the boxes methodically. On the outside of the decoration boxes in his mother’s neat script are descriptions of what’s inside. He peruses the labels, finger brushing over the words nativity, figurines, Disney ornaments, and tinsel, before his eyes fall on what he wants to do first. “Let’s start with putting up garland and inside lights, then all the figurines and little things, and we can do the tree last.”

“Sounds like a plan, _mijo_ ,” his dad says before setting to work. Julie can only give direction from the couch but she unwraps the more delicate things from those boxes and hands them off. The guys are pretty interested in helping and it only throws Carlos off a little bit when a floating Christmas decoration approaches him but it works. They also help get the harder to reach places so dad doesn’t have to spend as much time on a ladder to hang things closer to the ceiling.

Julie turns on the TV, flipping to a channel that does a Christmas movie marathon special every December and lets _Christmas Vacation_ play in the background. Carlos isn’t ashamed to admit when his eyes start to water when one of the boys hands him his mom’s favorite statuette. It’s a little snowman wearing a matching winter hat, scarf, and mittens, holding an open song book in it’s little hands. His _mama_ always said that it reminded her of the _parrandas_ she used to take part in when they visited her family in Puerto Rico for the holidays. A chill hand brushes away a stray tear and ruffles his hair, the gesture comforting rather than startling. “Thanks,” he whispers. The confirmative pat on the shoulder he receives makes him smile.

Once they’ve strung the garlands around the ceiling in most of the downstairs rooms, swirled lights up the stairs’ banister, switched out the kitchen towels for ones decorated with Christmas cookies, put out walls hangs, and placed all the tabletop décor in their rightful places, it’s time for the tree. “Finally!” Julie laments, upset at not having been able to help as much as she wants to.

“Here we go,” his dad says, pushing the box of ornaments towards her. “You unwrap, we hang.”

With the boys’ help, the artificial tree is up in no time at all, branches fluffed impeccably and ready to be loaded with decorations. Carlos and his dad wrap the tree in twinkling lights and gold garland, their methods perfected with years of practice. Julie begins removing bubble wrap from the ornaments, giving them to one of the boys, who hand it off to him and dad to hang on the tree. Julie tells stories as she goes, laying unwrapped ones beside her on the couch.

“We got this when we went to Disneyland and I nearly dropped it in the store,” she says, brandishing a model of Buzz and Woody sitting on a wrapped present. “Toy Story was one of my favorite movies and I just had to have it.”

Carlos watches the movie that’s still on as he decorates, feeling his usual twinge of jealousy when he sees the snow-covered front lawn of the Griswold family. Last year, when his family had travelled to Pennsylvania for the holidays, his cousins, Nat and Danny, and their parents had lead an ice skating trip at a big rink downtown. It had been a big family outing, all the aunts and uncles and their children perusing a Christmas village set up, the little ones just absolutely dying to see Santa. Just as he was about ready to step off the ice and get a hot chocolate to warm up, it had begun to snow. He hadn’t seen it in person in so long, but it was just as beautiful as he had remembered.

They’re about halfway done with the tree when his dad asks, “Are there any holiday traditions the boys want to do?”

There’s a beat of silence where an ornament gets placed in Carlos’s hand before he turns around to find the perfect spot for it before there’s an answer. “I mean, I’m Jewish, but my family never really practiced after my bar mitzvah,” Reggie says. “And Chanukah already started so it’s no big deal.”

“We can still get a menorah if you want,” Carlos responds. His friend Josh had been talking about the chocolate coins he received a few nights ago at school the other day which had started up a conversation about what his family does for Chanukah.

“It really would be no big deal,” his dad assures. “I wouldn’t mind getting one.”

Nobody says anything for a moment, Carlos not really noticing as he studies where there are empty spots still to fill. Then Julie says, “Did you guys hear him?”

And when Carlos turns around to see three additional bodies in his living room, it’s a bit of a miracle his startled jump doesn’t knock over the tree. “I- I can see them,” he struggles to get out, still gaping at the sight of them.

His dad is quiet as he moves to stands beside Carlos before he whispers, “I can see them, too.”

The boys look at each other, grins rapidly spreading over their mouths before Reggie lets out a whooping laugh. He approaches them with open arms, gathering the two of them in a chilly hug. Carlos’s arm goes up automatically. He had spent enough time with them, teaching them about pop culture and catching them up on movies and music and video games, but to finally be able to see them and hear them? Carlos’s mood skyrockets. “Promise me you won’t disappear again.” His grip tightens on Reggie as he looks at the other two.

 **“Cross my heart and hope to die,”** Reggie says earnestly even though the wording could use a little work.

“You idiot,” Alex remarks after another beat of silence, a fond if exasperated scoff following his words.

“Whoops,” is all Reggie says, sending up a round of raucous laughter from them all, still holding onto the Molina boys.

They finish decorating the tree once they start to get used to their new situation, his dad hoisting him up on one shoulder to place the star on top of the tree. Alex and Luke start up a round of carols, Julie and his dad joining in after she turns the TV off. Carlos hums along as he looks around appreciating their handiwork. Everything looks great if he does say so himself. The outside lights will go up when Flynn’s family comes over for dinner next and her dad can help, but everything else is very festive. He’s closing up the boxes to go back in the basement until January when he notices a little purple felt bag sitting at the bottom of one. _That’s_ what he forgot!

He picks it up, tugging lightly on Reggie’s sleeve, still a bit shocked he can actually do that now, and beckons him to follow him into the hallway. Once they’re out of ear shot, he asks, “What’s up, little dude?”

He checks out their surroundings, then leans in conspiratorially, Reggie doing the same. “Every year, it’s my job to hide the mistletoe somewhere unsuspecting. I want your help putting it somewhere ridiculous.”

“I am so in. Where were you thinking?” Carlos whispers he proposed hiding space and Reggie smiles deviously. “Great thinking. Let’s do it.”

After they successfully stow the mistletoe in a covert spot, they return to the living room where Julie is curled up beside dad, Luke is perched on the arm beside her and Alex is on the floor by her feet. Someone had turned on the old CD player in the room and they were listening to what sounded like Michael Bublé. Carlos hurries to fill the last available couch cushion, his dad slinging an arm around him as well. Reggie joins Alex on the floor and they all sit there, enjoying one another’s companies as Silent Night croons from the speakers.

“I can feel your mom here,” his dad whispers, squeezing Carlos and Julie closer to him.

Carlos looks around at the lights and the tree and all the lovingly selected decorations and can’t help but agree. His mom is there with them, amongst the snowmen and the ornaments and everything else, even the boys who brought music back to them. He knocks Reggie gently with his knee and sends him a smile, his own thank you for everything. “Yeah, dad,” he eventually responds. “Me, too.”

**Author's Note:**

> Happy Chanukah to my Jewish readers and I hope you have a blessed, safe holiday. I'm really very excited for this week's story and also the installments for the next two weeks! Just to let you all know, I've been having some serious writer's block the past week. No worries; I've worked ahead to account for this very occurrence I knew would happen so I've got a few stories on deck until I can jumpstart my creative juices. (Wow, I hated that phrase as soon as I wrote it.) Your comments have served as remarkable inspiration, so thank you very much. As always, prompts from [this list](https://p0ck3tf0x.tumblr.com/post/98502010026/one-hundred-ways-to-say-i-love-you) are open except for 7, 10, 12, 14, 16, 18, 19, 21, 26, 31, 33, 37, 38, 39, 41, 44, 48, 49, 50, 53, 57, 62, 63, 64, 65, 67, 70, 82, 83, 86, 91, 98, and 99. You can drop a comment here or send me a message on tumblr. Thank you all for your unending support, sweet things, and I'll see you next week!
> 
> main: [hi-hello-hey-there](https://hi-hello-hey-there.tumblr.com/)  
> side: [toziers-token](https://toziers-token.tumblr.com/)
> 
> love, blue


End file.
